Malaysia

WCS-Malaysia Program

Malaysia lies in the ever-wet tropics and the natural vegetation is tropical forest, from coastal mangroves and peat swamps to montane forests. In the west, where the Malay Peninsula extends southward from mainland Asia, the fauna includes gaur, tapir, elephants, tigers, great hornbills, and bearded pigs. The northern part of Borneo forms East Malaysia, with species endemic to Borneo, including orangutan, proboscis monkeys, Bornean ‘pygmy’ elephants, and Bulwer’s pheasants. WCS has worked for many years to help provide federal and state governments with ecological and population status information for policy making.

The Human Aspect
In both East and West Malaysia, the main human population centers are near the coast. West Malaysia is densely populated, while East Malaysia has large areas of sparsely populated forests in the interior. Although Malaysia is increasingly industrialized, cash crops and forestry are still important sources of employment and revenue. Many rural households depend on subsistence farming and forest products for their livelihood. The country’s culturally diverse population holds a wide range of attitudes to and perceptions of wildlife and nature.

Threats
The main threats to wildlife of Malaysia are habitat loss and unsustainable hunting. Large areas of forest are slated for conversion to agriculture or timber monocultures. Many protected areas are small, and most wide-ranging species depend on productive forests that are being logged for long-term survival, so improved management of timber production is important. Increased affluence in the cities and flourishing demand from other counties encourages unsustainable exploitation of wildlife and other forest products.  In Sarawak, a rapidly expanding road network means that formerly remote forests are now accessible to hunters with shotguns, spotlights and freezers. Human-wildlife conflicts complicate the management of elephants, tigers and orangutans, especially where small protected areas border inhabited areas and plantations.

WCS Activities
WCS has carried out a range of conservation research activities including:
· Broad-scale surveys of large mammals and large birds, especially primates, ungulates, hornbills and pheasants, providing information on distribution, population trends and threats.
· Detailed ecological studies on critical species (tigers, proboscis monkeys, flying foxes, red-banded langurs and orangutans).
· Studies of the effects of new road networks and expanding timber production on hunting patterns and pressures on wildlife populations.
Findings from this work formed part of the scientific basis for a review of policy in Sarawak, leading to the revision of protected area’s and wildlife laws – including a total ban on trade in wildlife – and expansion of the protected area system.
In addition, WCS has contributed to training programs for government agencies and undergraduates, modules on wildlife conservation and ecology, and has worked with rangers, NGOs and other stakeholders to protect endangered wildlife and their habitats.


Important Next Steps
While continuing the above activities, WCS will engage in the following:
· Build the capacity of government agencies, certification bodies and timber companies to implement and oversee wildlife mitigation measures in production forests.
· Address human-wildlife conflicts by promoting changes in human behaviour to reduce conflict, rather than depicting animals as ‘the problem’, e.g. through the ‘Teachers for Tigers Education’ program.
· Acquire ecological information on rare species: red banded langur, Bulwer’s pheasant, bay cat.
· Work with rural people on the need to actively manage hunted species as human population grows, and on appropriate methods of management and monitoring.
· Support developments in the education and professional training of wildlife and natural heritage managers to enable them to better deal with changing demands and to find new opportunities for conservation.
· Develop ways to monitor compliance with wildlife legislation (bearing in mind the difficulties of collecting data on illegal activities), and to encourage and strengthen enforcement agencies and their officers.